Tightly focused articles regarding the theory and practice of technology and software development project management.
Future in the Past – Part 1: Brief History of Agile
How did agile software engineering practices evolve? What were the initial software engineering practices, what were they based on, and what were the challenges that brought about the development of aging practices?This article will provide a brief introduction of how agile came to be developed. Note that agile methodologies are tools, like for example, writing. One doesn’t [Continue Reading]
Second Stride – Getting Started with Agile Requirements
So, you have defined your product vision. You have gained approval to proceed with refining what the product should be. In other words, you will be determining what the requirements should be. In scrum terms that means creating the Product Backlog. Officially, the Product Backlog is a prioritized list of all the known requirements, desires, wishes, or glimmers to be included in [Continue Reading]
Seeing the Future – Scrum Product Vision Creation
To quote Ken Schwaber: "The minimum plan necessary to start a Scrum project consists of a vision and a Product Backlog. The vision describes why the project is being undertaken and what the desired end state is." (Schwaber 2004, p. 68). This is great, it seems so simple, a vision of what you want to build and a list of stuff that is needed to achieve that vision. Of course, [Continue Reading]
Toolmaking – Utility Excel Macros for Project Managers
We, as Homo sapiens, are toolmakers. This capability is one of the primary separators of our species from all of the others on the planet. We find a problem, a repeated action, something that annoys us to perform, and sooner or later, we start making devices, gadgets, and tools to make the task easier or go away entirely. Even with software, probably one of the most powerful [Continue Reading]
A Wrinkling Time – Part 2: How to Execute Layered Calendar Management
Part 1 of this investigation of Layered Calendar Management in Microsoft Project explored the strategy and provided an overview of the features in MS Project that make the approach possible. This article covers how to put the strategy of Layered Calendar Management into practice. It provides step by step instructions on how the project manager can execute the methodology on [Continue Reading]
